Dear Diary, this year I promise not to stuff you with irrelevancies

GIVEN the capacity of every mobile phone and computer to provide you with a diary application these days, you would think that diaries in the physical sense would be dying off.

Actually, they seem to be on the increase.

I was given two at Christmas. One is a posh pocket-sized leather job with my name engraved on it – the kind you turn sideways to see what awful appointment you have for next Thursday. The other is unexpectedly bound in fuchsia-coloured faux leather. “Unexpectedly” because it’s the book-sized state diary with a gilt heart on the front of it produced by the Office of Public Works, and one doesn’t tend to associate the OPW with fuchsia faux leather.